Tag: spain

bookmark_borderCold and lonely in the deep dark night

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Aye the nights are fair drawing in, and that’s before the clocks change.

Last night, jogging alongside the water at Strathclyde Park, the sun was low over the trees and by the time we’d finished had disappeared completely. The path isn’t lit and so it looks like I’ll be needing to invest in something a little more visible for the coming months. Thankfully a new running store has opened a few blocks from my office, and JogScotland members get a 10% discount! Add some funds given for my birthday and I get to buy a new running top.

But the question is, long sleeved or ‘gilet’ (no sleeves). I have two long sleeved tops at the moment, and I do get quite hot when I run. So I’m thinking just a gilet for the time being, and when it starts getting REALLY cold, I’ll break out the running tigh… er.. leggings (and no, there will NOT be photos), and get a heavier sleeved top. Ohh and gloves. This is the one advantage of starting a new hobby, new toys!

God, I hope I’m not becoming a bore with all this, although I fear it’s only going to get worse once my Nike+ widget arrives (cheers Keith!!). I promise I’ll try not to become a ‘running’ bore (boar?).

Another nice present arrived today, the first of the Glass Books I mentioned in the sidebar a while back, chapter one of ten which gives me a nice pace to get me through the winter. Mind you, I’m still deciding what to take away with me to Spain at the end of the month. We’re only there for 6 nights so I reckon 4 books should do it.. any suggestions?

bookmark_borderMonday Miscellany

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1. Being linked from Dooce brings in a few extra hits. A few being something around the “60” mark, and certainly not as many as I would’ve thought… however the link was in her sidebar, not from the main content. I’ve had a similar number of ‘referrers’ from Reluctant Nomad (to whom I placed the link that Dooce linked to in the first place… if that makes sense).

2. My Google pagerank is 6, not 7 as I previously thought. Apologies to those who, when I mentioned the erroneous figure on Saturday, voiced their incredulity. I am sincerely sorry for wasting your incredulity, something which should be kept for REALLY incredible things… like Scotland beating France. Have I mentioned that?

3. Scotland beat France at football. Admittedly France did have the ball in our net a couple of times, but they were cheating, and we are the best team in the world. Or something. I don’t really care. We beat France. England couldn’t even beat that part-time team from Burger King.. um.. McDonalds… or wherever it was.

4. I did not watch Robin Hood. I will not watch Robin Hood. I have an irrational dislike of “popular” TV, this may be why I don’t understand all the fuss about that sci-fi programme that was on a while back, you know, the one with the dodgy production values and ‘star guests’ as baddies. Doctor How.

5. Still jogging. Sunday was harder than normal but then I don’t normally spend several hours in the pub on a Saturday, stumbling from bed 20 minutes before you are due to start probably isn’t advised either. Thankfully it was still the first week of the new block (of ten weeks) and the actual running time was low. Not so on Wednesday.

6. Why the FUCK does it take 10 days to “process a form”. I’m adding Louise to my bank account as we don’t have a joint account. This hasn’t been an issue in the past but is something I’ve been meaning to do for a while now and as the dribble of extra funds that we now have owed to us after the re-mortgage (which is almost complete, just waiting on first payment date) was presented to us via a cross cheque made out to, yes that’s right “Mr. Gordon McLean and Mrs. Louise McLean”… well our need to have an account that both of us can access suddenly leapt up the priority list.

Yes, I should have done something about this beforehand. Yet that still doesn’t explain why, having gone to the bank on Saturday morning with twenty-zillion different forms of ID for both of us, having completed the required form in triplicate, signing the form in our own blood, and providing DNA samples from the back of our eyelids, they still want to take 10 days to process the form. When I asked why the not-so-helpful wan… er.. assistant said that he wasn’t entirely sure but it had to go to the “central processing office”.

When I asked, with some vehemence, that that didn’t really explain why it would take so long he replied: “Well, I’m not exactly sure where it is but I think it’s somewhere south of the Quatanga Nebula, and hey, those little froolongs only have two fingers so maybe you should cut them some slack”.

Bemused and slightly befuddled I left the bank.

7. Thanks to all who left questions (well nearly all, some of you buggers just LOVE to be contrary). I’ll be tackling them over the coming weeks, and maybe keep a few back for the end of the month as we’re away to Spain for a sneaky week in the sun.

8. WE BEAT FRANCE. Sorry, this may take some time to sink in.

9. There is a possibility that I’ve fabricated one of the above items, part of it at least. However it’s quite subtle and I doubt many of you will spot it, but I thought I’d best be honest about it. There are parts that I made up.

10. I don’t really have something to add here but, well, by the time you get to 8 you sorta havta keep going to 10, right? You certainly can’t finish at least at 9, that’d never work. There are no “Top 9” lists (although maybe there should be?).

bookmark_borderToo much in my head

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Blimey, ever get one of those weeks when, all of a sudden, EVERYTHING starts to happen? Now so of the following I knew was coming up, but the majority of it has kinda snuck up on me.

At work we are counting to down to a minor release, hoping to get everything done for the end of the week. Nothing too stressful in that but it does mean a lot of last minute chasing of bits and bobs.

We are currently re-mortgaging as the fixed rate period for our current mortgage runs out after the next payment. We’ve got a deal we want, and the paperwork has just popped through the door. Need to get on that ASAP or we’ll end up paying another month of our old mortgage and that’ll cost us £85!

Having spotted some cheap flights to Spain we need to get them booked ASAP before the rates go up. However we need to wait until we get the mortgage stuff sorted out, if we have to pay that additional £85 we won’t be able to book the flights (they are only £70 return at the moment!).

And we are away for a few days from Thursday next week, which we are both looking forward to, but of course that shrinks the timescale and it wouldn’t surprise me if the lawyer dealing with our re-mortgaging will ‘urgently’ need something signed whilst we are away. Sod and his flippin’ laws…

Ohh yes, and we are getting quotes for a new front door (the old one is needing replaced) which we’ll need to get done before the winter, I’ve got two websites to design, with a third on the horizon, and we need to spend a day in the garden at some point as the weeds are starting to creep back! I need to find a venue for the next Scottish blogmeet, I’m helping a mate with some DIY in a couple of weeks, we need to visit the caravan to pick up some DVDs and our spare Sky box, I need to buy a long sleeved top for running, and my Mum’s birthday is coming up…

OK OK, so everyone is always busy, but why does it always come in spurts like this?

In other news: Pringles “Gourmet (ha ha) Flame-Grilled Steak and Caramelised Onion Flavour” crisps are rubbish.

bookmark_borderYesterday

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All my troubles seemed so faaarr awaaayyyyy…

Ahhh what a great song that is.. such wonderful melancholy. But I’m not. Quite happy as it turns out. Why so? Read on, dear reader, read on.

My darling wife turned *coughsplutter* yesterday, her brother came over for dinner, and my parents came over later on and we now have new plants for the garden, amongst other pressies of course. A few glasses of wine, and the rest we’ll leave unspoken.

I was slightly concerned about how Louise would be yesterday, the first birthday since her mother passed away, but aside from a little bubble she was in a hugely cheery mood. It was quite a relief, and this extends back to her week in Spain visiting her Dad, marks the end of another part of the grieving process. Since she came back from Spain she’s been a lot better, and a lot more focussed on her own life, and she’s back to being the wonderful woman I love. It’s a huge weight off my mind and, whilst there will still be moments and there are a few landmark dates to get through, we are starting to think of the future.

Life continues apace of course, the other stuff I do is going well, and I’m in mid-mockup for two sites (one a ong standing project), and recently finished one for a local company, who happens to be friends of ours – if I mention a games room in coming weeks you can find a photo of it, pre-pool table, on the site.

We’re planning a weekend away somewhere – York possibly – and are hoping to get out to Athens to visit a friend who is working there sometime in September. All good stuff.

Add all that to the fact it’s Friday and I’m positively a glow with cheer, not even the bloody weather can deter my mood.

Speaking of which:

Been updating this for a while now, not sure why though…

bookmark_borderTwo days off

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Ahh the joys of a long weekend stretch before me as I’ve got Thursday and Friday off this week, and yes I booked them before Louise had decided to fly to Spain (which was a last minute thing, but not a lastminute.com thing.. ).

Not that I’ll have much free time. Out for dinner tonight with my family, a couple of “places” to visit tomorrow, and a website to craft which must must MUST be live by July 1st when the new Yellow Pages comes out.

If it stops raining I also need to get some Pathclear down (or something stronger preferably… bleach maybe?) to stop the sudden and spectacular growth of weeds across our monoblock. The main problem is that there used to be a large (30ft) tree in the middle of the monoblocked area, as it grew it pushed the blocks up allowing gaps to appear between them… and in those gaps weeds flourish. Cheap suggestions (we can’t afford to re-lay the area at the moment) are welcomed.

Ohh and I’ll need to hire a skip to get rid of the remnants of the past few nights worth of parties, not to mention hire a french polisher (ohh Yellow Pages again, spooky).

So, it may be a bit quiet here, but in a good way.

bookmark_borderSmorgasbord

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Only a couple of weeks after mentioning my dual monitor setup at work and what happens? They buy us all 19″ LCD screens, no more old flickering CRTs.. woo hoo…

AND I get a RAM upgrade for my laptop (2GB now).

AND tonight is the Champions League final.

In other news, it looks like Louise is off to Spain for a week. Her flight leaves at stupid o’clock in the morning middle of the night, and she’ll be joined by her sister and our youngest nephew. Which means that I get to fend for myself for the week. Needless to say the immediate thoughts of “yeah… party!!” are replaced by “but who will iron my clothes and cook my dinner?!”.

I bet you think I’m kidding…

Her Dad is really chuffed, and I know it will mean a lot to Louise to see him again as we didn’t really think we’d be able to get out there until later in the year. And hey, it also means cheap booze for me! A litre bottle of Southern Comfort for starters…

~

Ohh and a question for you all. Professionally I know a few people in my industry but would never claim to have a network of contacts. It’s not ever been something that’s bothered me overly as, in my profession at least, it doesn’t make a huge difference. In fact, if I’m honest, the entire “networking” thang has me a bit perplexed. Other than collecting contact details for large numbers of people you probably won’t contact until you need something from them (which seems a little… rude?) is there more to it?

Do you “network”? If so, any tips?